The capabilities of a computer are maximized by utilizing a variety of external peripheral devices that are connected to the computer. This may involve any number of peripherals. In response to computers becoming more modular, a Universal Serial Bus (USB) interface standard was jointly developed. The USB standard defines a high-speed serial data interface between a computer and add-on devices, such as keyboards, printers, scanners and secondary storage devices, including floppy disk drives, hard disk drives, and solid-state secondary storage drives. In computers that have USB compliant ports, such devices can be added or removed while the computer is powered up and running.
With the growing popularity of portable computing devices having USB compliant ports, such as notebook, tablet computers, and personal digital assistants (PDA), the USB ports afford on-the-go flexibility to a user of the portable computing device. That is, the user of a notebook can carry multiple external peripheral devices, and simply plug the needed external peripheral device into the portable computing device when needed.
Recently, flash memory cards are also being sold that contain a USB connector. Such USB-flash memory cards do not require a specialized reader but can be plugged into a USB connector on a personal computer (PC) or other hosting device. These USB-flash memory cards can be used in place of floppy disks and are known as USB key drives, USB thumb drives, and a variety of other names. These USB-flash cards can have a capacity of more than ten floppy disks in an area not much larger than a large postage stamp.
FIG. 1 shows an assembly of a male slim USB connector that is integrated with a circuit-board substrate of a flash memory card according to the prior art; and FIG. 2 shows a cross-sectional view of AA-AA in FIG. 1. As shown in FIGS. 1 and 2, the miniaturized USB Pen Driver includes a metallic conductive housing 11 having a plurality of orientated indentation 111, and a print circuit board assembly (PCBA) 12 for providing storing memory. Furthermore, the thickness of the print circuit board assembly (PCBA) 12 is usually insufficient, thereby making data reading and storing difficult. Therefore, in order to overcome this drawback, the height needs to be increased with the aid of another object.
Consequently, the miniaturized USB Pen Driver also includes a flake spacer 13 disposed between the metallic conductive housing 11 and the PCBA 12 for fitting the PCBA 12 in the metallic conductive housing 11 tightly, wherein the flake spacer 13 could be made from a metallic slice or a plastic (Mylar) slice. The flake spacer 13 is used to fill up the space between the metallic conductive housing and the PCBA 12. However, in practice, the flake spacer 13 is not easy to be fabricated into the space between the metallic conductive housing 11 and the PCBA 12. Therefore, the USB Pen Driver of the prior art could not be miniaturized effectively.
FIG. 3 shows an assembly of USB memory apparatus according to the prior art, and FIG. 4 shows a cross-sectional view of A-A in FIG. 3. As shown in FIGS. 3 and 4, the USB memory apparatus includes a metallic conductive housing 31 having a plurality of orientated indentation 311, and a print circuit board assembly (PCBA) 32 for providing storing memory. Similarly, the miniaturized USB memory apparatus also includes a flake spacer 33 disposed between the metallic conductive housing 31 and the PCBA 32 for fitting the PCBA 32 in the metallic conductive housing 31 tightly. Due to the flake spacer 33, the inner space of the metallic conductive housing 31 is further decreased. In practice, there is no enough space for introducing a LED indicator. If a LED indicator should be introduced into the USB memory apparatus, the prior art has to add extra space for containing the module of the LED indicator. Therefore, the USB memory apparatus of the prior art can not introduce a LED indicator without increasing extra space, and can not be miniaturized effectively
Although such multi-application USB memory apparatuses are technically feasible, in practice they are very difficult to implement, as demonstrated by numerous pioneering attempts ever since the invention of the miniaturized USB memory apparatus itself. It needs to provide a miniaturized Universal Serial Bus (USB) memory apparatus, which decreases the cost, simplifies the manufacturing process, is capable of introducing extra module, such as a LED indicator into the USB memory apparatus without increasing entirety volume thereof, and can rectify those drawbacks of the prior art and solve the above problems.